Re: [gentoo-project] Social Contract clean-up

[Rich Freeman <rich0@gentoo.org>]

On Tue, Mar 27, 2018 at 4:26 PM, Daniel Robbins <drobbins@funtoo.org> wrote:
>
> My point is this -- the organizational structure that exists, exists. It's
> for everyone's benefit if those who do not like the organizational structure
> leave the project and do their own thing, under a different organizational
> structure, and those that do stay, do support it as it is intended to
> function so that it can be the best it can be.

What if "the best it can be" simply isn't good enough?  That is the
concern here.

If I thought that the system that puts the board responsible for
finances in charge of everything else was sustainable I'd just work
within that system.  I'd just encourage the Council to run for Trustee
slots and all would be well, and I'd probably have run for a Trustee
position last year again.

However, there are real problems with this because the
skills/interests of those capable of running the distro vs the
Foundation don't overlap well.  And honestly I'm not sure anybody is
really capable of running the Foundation in its current state, at
least not who is inclined to do so or has the time to do so.  That
isn't a knock on the Trustees - it is just pointing out that they have
quite a hole to dig themselves out of.

> Anyone who really isn't behind the trustees and the NFP system should leave,
> because that is the system we have and will continue to have.

This assumes that this is something impossible to change, and that
makes no sense.  Other FOSS projects have restructured into
umbrella-based models, and there are surely other models that might
also work.

For all the talk of ivory towers around here the ones suggesting
having the Trustees be in charge seem to be ones trying to get
everybody who disagrees to leave.  You're actually the second person
to suggest that I do so, though the other was not made publicly.

The Foundation has been around for quite a while.  It has had MANY
turnovers in the Trustees.  Many of them have no doubt been capable.
And yet in this time we've had the corporate registrations expire
once, a few terms with not all the slots filled, and the latest news
seems to be that nobody can find any evidence that anybody has filed
the legally-required annual tax forms (which was news to me because
when I was on the Trustees I'm pretty sure I had been told that they
were being filed).

IMO the blame is not in the Trustees themselves, but that the approach
just isn't a good fit for Gentoo.  I don't blame those who set it up
either, because I don't think anybody would have realized how it would
have turned out in the end, and there weren't a lot of alternative
models back then.  I think that people step into the role of Trustee
or Treasurer intending to get things sorted out, and then find that it
is a huge black hole of time demands that they just can't keep up
with, until they leave.  Maybe they'll advance things while they're in
the role, but it never seems to be enough.

If we're going to stay in the NFP business then we need to come to
grips with the effort required and actually make it sustainable.
Otherwise we're just playing games with a legal entity until somebody
gets around to calling the whole thing into question.  Granted, that
might never happen since we're small potatoes, but nobody can promise
that so it is a risk.

-- 
Rich